Tag Archives: romantic suspense

I woke up at 2 am with an epiphany of sorts and the deep desire to share it with you. I realize that I have not blogged in some time – too busy with writing and life… but this you have got to hear.

How many authors really LIKE reviews? Hmmm. I for one have reviews that I like, but I also have some that I want to grab the reviewer and shake them and say…. “You don’t even know the details of the story; you are missing MAJOR parts and your reading comprehension is way off base – how could you possible understand it???”

That being said, even those who have the wrong name for the main character, have no idea of the year or context of the book, or have missed some giant detail that makes everything they know about a book completely false – even they can and do have some merit. That is exactly the case with a review I just saw come through a few days ago that says that one of my books is NOT a romance, and to her I can emphatically reply – NO – it’s not!!!

I have said this to so many people at meet and greets, Facebook Events, and book signings – I don’t write romance, even though my books almost always contain a romantic element. The people in my stories are always caught up in an incredible adventure, sometimes an incredibly HORRIBLE adventure; that’s what my stories are about. They are suspense and/or thriller. When, how and even IF they fall in love is something that happens along the way, not the reason their story is being told. Sometimes they end up together and sometimes they don’t, and this isn’t CHOOSE YOUR OWN ADVENTURE, so YOU do not get to pick the ending.

My books will never be Harlequin’s; they will never follow a ‘romantic arch’ or fit in any cookie-cutter mold you want to stuff them into with a neatly predictable plot line. There are going to be surprises you didn’t see coming. There are going to be elements you never thought of and choices (hard damn choices) you aren’t always going to understand or like. That’s what a Samantha Jacobey book is all about, and I have enough GREAT reviews to know that is exactly what MANY readers enjoy most about my work.

So what did I gain from this cathartic awakening? I realized that I LOVE reviews – even bad ones! I love to have people say things that get me to thinking and considering the possibilities; I guess that’s the debater in me. They help me get to the deepest question of them all – why? I find myself asking that most often after someone has blasted me on Amazon or Goodreads, and like with all living things, I find that struggle and strife are good for me; they help me to reflect and make me stronger in the end.

Therefore, I want to say a HUGE thank you to everyone who writes a review – good, bad, wrong, or ugly. You keep voicing those opinions, and I will keep putting out books that make you scratch your head and say… “Damn; I didn’t see that coming.”

UPDATE – it looks like everyone who started over the weekend finished on time – thank you all for participating and a HUGE thank you to all the pages who hosted for us!!!

Guys – I have been coordinating with several blog sites to line up a huge giveaway weekend event for A New Life: Life of Recovery, so those of you who have been wanting to win a copy, get your clicker finger ready!!!

I will update this post with links as they become available, as it looks like we will be hosted by 10 different bloggers… that will be 10 signed paperbacks up for grabs, plus at least 10 ebook copies!!!!

Oh, and if you haven’t noticed, I LOVE to send my girl around the world, so if you are outside the states, you are STILL ELIGIBLE TO WIN – So lets see where else in the world we can send our heroine TORI FARRELL

You can follow me here – on facebook – or hit up my twitter – see the contacts link for more information

UPDATE – a few still have not posted their giveaway (we will get it eventually I am sure) but feel free to hit these guys up for your chance to win!!!

I will leave this page up until all have cleared, as some have notified me they will be late in posting…. WEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE

FOLLOW THESE LINKS TO REGISTER – EACH LINK IS ANOTHER OPPORTUNITY TO WIN

jUST CLICK AND FOLLOW THE DIRECTIONS ON THEIR SITE… ENJOY AND GOOD LUCK OUT THERE!!!

1. Completed – thank you so much Scandalous Book Blog for hosting us on facebook!!!

Once again, I have been forced to work things out for myself. I paid someone to create a trailer for Life of Recovery and Life of Doubt weeks ago, and so far all I have gotten is a sad video for the first one. And by sad I mean… I hated it. That would just not do.

I got up this morning at normal time, 5 am, made coffee and set to work on the second video, Life of Doubt. I had already mapped out the song I wanted to use and the items that were to go into the video. All I had to do was figure out how to use the movie maker and upload it… how hard could that be?

It actually took about two hours for me to figure out how to use the program effectively, getting all of the timing exactly as I wanted it, and to complete the video. It also took another half an hour to get it uploaded, but it is done.

Now all I need is for a few people to go look at it and tell me what you think… so how about it?

Oh my god – I get it!!! I have been messing with twitter off and on for weeks and could just not get my head around what the heck it was all about. So you guys leave me some comments here if I am or am not on the right track.

Twitter is like a massive instant message system. With like 140 characters per message. That means if you have a lot to say, too bad, you have got to cut it down. That is not really the hard part though.

The hard part are these silly hash-tag things. I just could not understand, but I refused to give up. So I played around with it, looked at other people’s tweets, did some clicking, and it is too funny… #anewlife has almost no one using it, and #lifeofrecovery had 3, including me. That is hilarious. The thing I have run into most during normal searches is OVERUSE and not being able to find my book when I am looking for it with one of those.

Now, I think what is supposed to happen is you are supposed to use tags that are popular, and I have that covered. So far I have tried out #goodbook, #suspense #romance, #romantic #suspense, #ebook, and #amazon.

Most of those get a good deal of traffic, but #amazon you can’t even keep up with. I love this!!! I want to make little tweets that have pieces out of my book just to attach the tags now, isn’t that funny? And here a few weeks ago I was thinking about not using it at all.

I do have one thought though… is it possible to over tweet? I mean, I don’t want to run everyone off, now that I have over 70 followers – which I want to thank Up All Night Book Blog for most of those. If you haven’t gotten in on their drawing for a signed copy of my book, you still have about a day left.

Anyways, I hope that I don’t run anyone off, but I will probably start doing more tweeting now that I get how the silly thing works and see where it leads. Another new adventure – weeeeee.

If you want to follow me, I would love to have you, @SamJacobey, and feel free to retweet anything you like… I am loving this.

I love the word random. It implies so many things. I myself am a random person. That means that I have the tendency to change directions in quick, unpredictable moments of fancy. Now, those who have known me the longest are calling BS at this exact moment, because I am also known as a planner, keeping my work done far in advance and coming up with some very great plans. I keep my day’s schedule lined out, seeming to be upset when things are not moving according to plan. What they don’t realize is, that this is a coping mechanism to counteract my randomness and to help me be successful in a non-random world.

So what exactly does it mean to be random? To me, it means that I can think fast on my feet and can come up with information and ideas at a moments notice, and often these are great plans. I have held many jobs where this ability has served me well. Working with a large number of people, such as with the public, being able to change directions or come up with a plan on the fly is a great benefit. It also means that I am pretty unpredictable and have to work hard not to be scattered.

What it really means is that the creative juices always flow, and that I am thinking when there is no reason to be. I guess you could say I am planning, even when there is no benefit to planning. There have been times that I would have paid to make the never ending stream of thoughts that go on inside my head stop, and just be quiet, and enjoy the moment, and stop planning or thinking 5 steps ahead. Perhaps this is why those who know me and see me from the outside think I am a planner; because to some extent, they are right.

I am a planner. I plan ahead and hope for the best. Then I change the plan. Often. By the time we get there, how things go is seldom how my plan started out. Furthermore, having things go according to plan is sometimes downright boring. I mean, I love doing things that I plan on for a while, but then after it has been going for a bit, or I really get good at it, I just get tired and I am ready to do something else. That’s random. Or was that the plan?

So here is my random act of the day – giving my books away. I changed my cover page here on my blog to explain how I am going to do that. If you are interested in checking out a FREE copy of my book – Life of Recovery, be sure to visit the main page on my blog. Now for the plan…. you need to be 18+, as this is an Adult Novel, and it is NOT a self-help book, nor is it of a religious base. If you are interested in receiving a free copy, please visit my new front page at https://samanthajacobey.wordpress.com/, as the page that I planned and put there is now boring to me and I have selected another to take its place. See, I guess that was the plan.